Education secretary visits Mayo, says he likes what he sees

State secretary of education Matthew Malone checks out some math work with Aaron Femia, left, and Anushi Mohan, right.
Patricia Roy photo Matthew Malone, the state secretary of education, made a visit to Mayo Elementary School Feb. 6, touring classrooms and giving a heads-up on prospective state aid to principal Judith Evans and district school superintendent Darryll McCall.

“There will be level funding for regional transportation, and that was a victory,” Malone said, presenting the possibility of schools struggling for every state aid dollar.

The formula that determines how much municipalities pay to educate students and how much money the state gives them in local aid works against towns in the Wachusett Regional School District, where there is little commercial tax base, making homeowners shoulder almost all the tax burden.

Malone was in the area and decided to visit local schools.

Malone said he was impressed with the WRSD schools — he also toured Paxton Center School that day — and liked the pod set-up, in which a group of classrooms center around an open area or pod, that can be used for computer work, group projects or getting several classes together for a presentation.

Creation-based, or hands-on, learning far surpasses the kind where students are seated in rows, he said.

He also praised the freedom the teachers had to design their mode of teaching curriculum units that gave the school a standards-based curriculum that teachers “really own.”

“There’s an amazing sense of collaboration at ground level among the teachers,” Malone observed.

“It’s the kind of thing, that if you’re a parent, you want to move here.”

As Malone watched a fifth grade class work on a project on renewable energy, he said the emphasis on real world learning is one reason why he likes the state’s common core educational standards designed to help students prepare for their place in an increasingly complex and technologically driven world.

The school’s hallway displays showcased non-fiction writing by students, which Malone said is a critical writing style for children to learn.

“When kids do more non-fiction writing, their SAT scores go through the roof, “ he said. “It’s factual and contextual. The kids have to create an argument and defend it with data.”

Glancing out a doorway at a recess in progress, Malone watched children bundled in snowsuits, sledding and tubing down schoolyard hills.